CHENNAI: Chennaites will have to wait longer to access the Chennai Central Metro station as the work is likely to be completed by the first quarter of next year.
A Chennai Metro Rail official said that the tunnelling work on the stretch was yet to be completed. “We have completed the upline but the downlink has yet to be completed,” the official said.
He said that going by the work, it is unlikely to get the stretch up and running by the year-end. “Currently, the green line from St Thomas Mount to Nehru Park is now 19.3-km long. The 2.7-km stretch linking Central Station via Egmore is expected to open in the first quarter of 2018,” he said.
He said the underground stretch from Nehru Park to Chennai Central along with the 4-km stretch from AG-DMS to Little Mount would be opened simultaneously.
Interestingly, the work is progressing at a rapid pace on the 4-km underground stretch with flagging off a locomotive to undertake trials.
Chennai Metro Rail said that soon there would be trial run by Metro trains once the system integration work got over.
The integrated trials followed by system integration would be conducted during the trials to get the stretch ready for operation.
This stretch from DMS to Saidapet comprises four stations - Saidapet, Nandanam, Teynampet and AG-DMS. The entire stretch is a commercial area and is dotted with government offices, colleges as well as hotels, malls and shopping areas. It would also connect Anna Nagar with DMS as well as DMS with Airport, said a Metro Rail official.
Apart from completion of works by installing systems including tunnel ventilation, signalling, platform screen doors, automatic fare collection gates, the final lap of finishing work on the underground Metro stations too is underway on the stretch.
Poonamallee extension
Meanwhile, the Metro Rail extension under the second phase from the CMBT to Poonamallee will be a underground one, said the Metro Rail official. He said consultancy firm RITES is preparing a detailed project report.
Initially, a detailed project report (DPR) has been prepared for three Metro Rail corridors in the second phase covering a total of 107.5 km.